Level of Detail in Engineering Visualization

The broadening use of visualisation of large data sets suggests the
design of a visuali-sation client/server architecture, using supercomputer
or distributed cluster hardware architectures. The aim is to allow remote
users to receive a visualisation an a level of detail which can be selected
to suit the need at hand.

The thesis will work towards a implementation under Linux of visualisation
using graphics tools in the GLview system, that allows levels of detail to
be presented and will demonstrate the network connection between a visualisation
server and client.

The theoretical component of the thesis will examine abstract data types
that allow levels of approximation to be chosen.

Aim: To create a system using a client/server approach that allows a user
to retrieve visualisations from the server at a chosen level of detail.

Environment: The system will be designed to exploit the unix operating system,
especially its interprocess communication and its ability to establish TCP/IP
network connections. Where possible, parallelism will be exploited. The
GLview software will be used as the graphics
library.

Theoretical: There exist mathematical frameworks for representing information
at varying levels of detail. These methods include structural approaches,
where a partial ordering is defined for the data types in use based on their
components, and tree representations; the use of numerical tools such as
Fourier components, discrete cosine transform and wavelets, where a signal
can be represented at various levels of detail by recombining chosen fragments;
and statistical methods.

Perceptual: There is a body of knowledge on the response of the human vision
system. This will be examined to decide how to choose the components for
presentation at varying levels of detail.

An interface to drive the system will be needed for test and demonstration
purposes: it is not intended to create a production quality man-machine
interface in the doctoral project.